


Probation

by frozensea



Category: Star Wars - All Media Types, Star Wars Sequel Trilogy
Genre: Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Banter, Ben Solo Lives, Crack-ish, F/M, Fix-It, Force Healing, M/M, Multi, That's Not How The Force Works, Too Many Limbs, or maybe it does, sadly no lemons, who knows at this point - Freeform
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-04-07
Updated: 2020-04-07
Packaged: 2021-03-02 02:28:23
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,002
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/23527654
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/frozensea/pseuds/frozensea
Summary: Poe knew from the moment he set foot on Exegol that he and this planet would never be friends.
Relationships: Poe Dameron/Finn, Poe Dameron/Finn/Ben Solo | Kylo Ren/Rey, Poe Dameron/Finn/Rey, Rey/Ben Solo | Kylo Ren
Comments: 10
Kudos: 49
Collections: Party in the GFFA: Star Wars Flash Exchange 2020





	Probation

**Author's Note:**

  * For [ambiguously](https://archiveofourown.org/users/ambiguously/gifts).



Poe knew from the moment he set foot on Exegol that he and this planet would never be friends.

To be fair, the whole "lair of Palpatine" thing was bad enough on its own, but if you added the gravity wells that made flying to this backwater hellhole more dangerous than stepping on the tail of a Hutt, it really wasn't worth the trouble. On top of that, they were greeted by nothing but a solid wall of fog when they parked the Millenium Falcon, which meant that they would be walking blindly in what could very possibly be an ambush by however many of Palpatine's minions had survived the destruction of his citadel. It all summed up to Exegol being the kind of place that Poe didn't want to be.

But Rey was here. Somewhere. And that's why he and Finn wouldn't leave until they found her.

"I have a bad feeling about this," Poe said as he stepped off the Falcon while sighting down the barrel of his blaster.

He and Finn cautiously approached the entrance of the citadel. In the skies above Exegol, the ships belonging to Palpatine's Final Order were still crashing toward the ground, and the earth beneath them trembled with their impact.

"Let's just find Rey and get out of here," Finn said grimly.

"And kill Palpatine," Poe added.

"Pretty sure he's dead."

"That's what everyone thought the last time. I'm not taking the chance. I want to see the body."

Finn shrugged. "It can't hurt to be sure, but I have a feeling..."

"What kind of feeling"

"Just a... feeling."

Poe rolled his eyes. "Yeah, I have plenty of those, too. And I don't need to be Force-sensitive to get them."

Finn sighed. "You're not going to stop making a thing out of that, are you?"

"Not anytime soon. I should have guessed, really, what with all the funny faces and staring off into the distance but, honestly, I thought you were just trying to work up the nerve to flirt with me already."

"Why would I flirt with you?"

Poe gave him an incredulous look. He made an up and down gesture that encompassed the entirety of his body. "Excuse you? The hair. The swagger. Why _wouldn't_ you flirt with me? Rey does it all the time."

"You're confusing flirting with arguing, which probably shouldn't-"

"These things are not mutually exclusive."

"-surprise me, considering-"

"In fact, they add a bit of spice-"

"-that we argue all the time."

"-to the game," Poe finished with a grin while he watched Finn process his own words.

"Oh," Finn said after a moment. "You've been flirting with me this entire time."

"I thought I was pretty obvious, actually."

Finn seemed to ponder this and Poe decided not to push it since more important matters required their attention.

They picked their way through the rubble of the citadel, careful to cover each other as best as they could with the limited visibility available to them. Aside from a few distant explosions overhead, the planet had grown eerily quiet.

"I'm new to this," Finn finally said. "Relationships, even friendships, were... strongly discouraged among the rank and file."

Poe nodded understandingly. There were a lot of things he could interpret into what exactly 'strongly discouraged' meant, and none of them were good.

"I get it. It's okay."

"I mean, you're not wrong about the hair and the swagger and... everything else."

He chanced a glance at Finn's face. He looked hesitant as if he were trying to find his way in the dark.

"I'm not?" Poe prompted gently.

"No, but there's a time and a place, and right now we need to find Rey."

Which was a fair point.

"And she should be part of this discussion," Finn continued.

Poe smiled and nudged Finn's shoulder until he turned his head to look at him. "Yeah, she should be."

Finn's shoulders visibly relaxed.

"You didn't honestly believe that I'd leaver her out?" he asked in honest bewilderment because the idea had never occurred to him.

But Finn only shrugged. "You argue with a lot of people, Poe."

"Well-"

 _"A lot_ of people."

He didn't even attempt to deny it. "To be fair, there are a lot of things worth arguing about, such as certain people making a secret out of their Force-sensitivity."

Finn groaned. "You need to let that go."

"You could have told me."

 _"I didn't know_. Not for sure, at least. Not until..." he broke off, and a quick glance at his suddenly stricken expression had Poe freezing mid-step.

"What? What is it? What's wrong?"

"I felt her die."

Poe blanched. "What are you talking about?"

"Rey," Finn said and the emotions swimming in his eyes showed that he was still shaken. "I felt her die."

Poe felt as if a cold lump of lead had dropped into his stomach. It couldn't be true. _I couldn't._ Finn would not be out here flirting and bickering with him if he knew Rey was dead.

"But it's okay now. She's not dead anymore."

Poe tore a hand through his hair in frenzied aggravation. He'd always felt decidedly neutral about all this Force-nonsense, but right now he loathed it with a fiery passion.

"Finn, what the hell are you saying? Either you felt her die and she's dead, or she's alive, which means she never died in the first place."

"I could feel her die in the Force, Poe, and then... I don't know... she came back."

"How?"

"I don't know, okay. I don't know how this works. I just know what I know."

"Well, that's helpful," he snapped. Something occurred to him then, and he wasn't sure how he felt about it. "You don't think that-"

"What?"

"You don't think that R- Ben had anything to do with it, do you?"

"You think he saved her?"

"I mean, maybe he finally did something useful?" He made no secret out of how reluctant he felt to accept Solo's sudden change of heart.

Finn opened his mouth as if to defend the former Supreme Leader, then apparently remembered who he was talking about and shrugged. "He did seem sincere when he surrendered to us."

Poe scoffed. "Words are cheap. I'll only believe that when he's actually put his life on the line."

"He'll have to do more than that if he wants to make up for everything he did. Everyone can die in a blaze of glory. Doesn't mean it settles all scores."

"No argument there."

The fog parted to reveal a giant slap of rock ahead that was split down the middle.

"Look." As they approached the center of the ruins, Finn pointed towards a large shadow that slowly took the form of an old X-wing.

"Well, at least now we know that we're on the right track. She made it."

"So did he," Finn said and pointed toward the imperial TIE-fighter parked next to it.

"Let's hope that's a good sign."

They heard Rey before they saw her. Her labored breathing was accompanied by quiet cursing as she heaved herself out of a giant hole in the ground.

"Rey!"

Her head came up when Finn called her name. She looked exhausted. Her face was covered in dust but she smiled when she saw them.

"You came," she panted. "You came back for me."

"Of course, we did."

Her grin drooped around the edges as she acknowledged the sentiment behind his words. She briefly wiped her eyes, then turned to look back into the hole while extending a hand over it.

Finn and Poe rushed towards her, climbing over jagged rocks and torn metal as fast as they could.

"What happened to you?" Poe asked. "Is Palpatine- holy crap."

Kylo Ren's body floated out of the hole. Rey grabbed his foot and pulled him towards her, then dragged him by his heel until she met up with the two of them.

"Is he dead?" Finn couldn't help but ask even though Ren's ashen complexion appeared to answer the question on its own.

"Only mostly dead."

"What's that supposed to mean?"

Kneeling beside them, with her hands on her knees, Rey tried to catch her breath. She gave them a grim smile. "Well, mostly dead means slightly alive, doesn't it?"

Poe holstered his weapon. "Alright, let's get him to a medbay then."

But Rey shook her head. "That won't be enough. He gave me all of his life force to bring me back."

"Bring you back?" Poe exclaimed with a wary look at Finn.

"I died," Rey said quietly. "I killed Palpatine, but it cost me all I had. Ben saved me."

Finn knelt next to her. "I felt it. I felt you die."

Rey swallowed hard as she looked up at him. Poe couldn't have said which one of them moved first, and it didn't matter. They embraced each other fiercely, and Poe momentarily felt like a third wheel before he told himself that he was being stupid and got down next to them to wrap his arms around both.

"I'm okay," Rey said with tears in her voice. "I'm alive and you're both here. It's going to be okay."

His eyes burning, Poe clutched her and Finn more tightly.

"You want to try and bring him back," Finn said when they finally let go of each other.

His words were sobering.

Rey nodded. "I don't have enough strength to do it on my own, but if the two of you help..." she broke off when she caught their dubious expressions. "I know that he hurt you and that you have more than enough reason to hate him, but he turned back to the light. He stood with me against Palpatine."

"We know," Poe interrupted her as he got back to his feet. "We talked after you took off with his TIE-fighter. He surrendered to the Resistance."

"Well," Finn interjected. "He didn't. Not really. It was more like him promising to surrender to the Resistance if we gave him the Falcon so he could go after you and kill Palpatine."

"To which we politely told him to fuck off."

"Not that politely," Finn said. "Anyway, we did help him get one of the Death Star's TIE-fighters flightworthy. We figured we wouldn't really be able to hold him prisoner anyway."

"Finn said to let him go," Poe said pointing a finger at him.

"I had a... feeling that he was sincere," Finn grudgingly admitted. "So I decided to take a chance."

"Looks like it paid off," Poe said as he carelessly nudged Kylo's shoulder with the tip of his boot as if he were a curious beetle that had behaved in unexpected ways. "What exactly do you want us to do?" he asked.

Rey wiped her forehead with the back of her wrist. She really did look exhausted. "I want to transfer some of your life force to him."

"The way you healed the worm?" Finn nodded in understanding.

Poe looked at her for a long moment, then sighed, shoulders slumping. He might feel highly ambivalent about striking Kylo from his kill-on-sight list, but it wasn't as if he was going to say no. Big, damn hero and all that. It was too deeply ingrained in his bones to even consider walking away. Better to ask the important questions instead. "Is it safe?"

Rey nodded. "I won't channel more than you can spare. You'll need to take it easy for a couple of days. Get enough sleep and food, that sort of thing, but I won't put you in danger to save him. I give you my word."

 _And isn't she the biggest damn hero of us all_ , he thought as he looked down at her. "Rey, I'm not concerned about us. What I was asking was, is it safe for you? Because you look as if you're about to keel over."

An expression of embarrassment flitted across her face, so fleeting that Poe thought he might have imagined it, but then her mouth compressed into a thin, determined line. "I tried to bring him back on my own but I couldn't without endangering myself. It was just enough to keep him with me."

She rubbed her wrist across her forehead again, and Poe realized that she was sweating despite the cold. He hastily shrugged out of his jacket and placed it around her shoulders.

Rey accepted it without argument, which only drove the point home just how draining the fight with Palpatine had been for her.

 _She died_ , Poe reminded himself, and his chest suddenly felt too tight. _If Ben hadn't gone after her, we'd be coming back here to collect her body._

"I can do this," Rey said, and he had no choice but to believe her. In any case, wasting time arguing would only prevent her from getting the rest she needed.

His decision made, he held her gaze. "I'm not doing this for him," Poe said with a glance at Ben's ashen face. "I'm doing it for you."

Rey nodded. "I understand." She shifted around until she was kneeling between him and Finn with Ben's body stretched out in front of them. "You need to touch me."

"Skin to skin, or will anywhere do?" Poe asked. He didn't feel entirely comfortable with all this Force stuff. He'd grown up with the legends of Luke and Vader, but with so few Force-users around, the entire issue had always seemed far removed from his reality, more the stuff of storybooks than real life, and even though the past year with Rey had changed all that, he wasn't sure how he felt about the Force working directly on him.

 _Well, I'm about to find out_ , he thought. _Saving my mortal enemy. I sure didn't think it would ever come to this._

His gaze strayed to Ben. _Though he doesn't look much like a mortal enemy anymore, does he?_

In rest, Ben looked younger, almost peaceful... and weirdly attractive with his plush lips and ridiculously broad shoulders. Poe snorted. _Maybe that's a Jedi thing? Join the Light side, get a glow up._

"Poe?"

His head snapped around and he found Rey and Finn looking at him with identical, odd expressions on their faces. "What?"

"I was saying that anywhere will do. With the touching?" she prompted when he gave her a blank look.

"Right. Yeah. Of course."

"If you want us to give you a moment to ogle the unconscious Darksider in peace-" Finn started.

"Very funny."

"Buddy, you were totally staring at him, and as someone who has been on the receiving end of that particular look I don't mind telling you that I'm starting to feel a little jealous here."

"You're the one who said we should let him go because you had _a feeling_ about him," Poe snapped, too embarrassed to keep his cool.

"Boys? Can we focus for just a moment? This is a little time-sensitive."

Feeling immediately guilty about his reaction, Poe apologized.

Rey placed one of her hands on Ben's stomach and offered the other to Finn, who threaded his fingers through hers. After a moment's hesitation, Poe knelt behind her, wrapped an arm loosely around her waist and placed his chin on her shoulder. His other hand found Finn's and holding on to them settled him in a way he'd never considered he might need. "This okay?" he asked.

"It's fine." She leaned back into him for a moment. "It's nice."

"I'm sorry for being an inconsiderate jerk. I'll be good now."

Finn snorted. "I'll remind you of that promise in about ten minutes."

"It's very optimistic of you to believe he will last that long," Rey teased.

"You two are just hilarious."

"Someone has to keep that giant ego in check," Finn said with a smile.

Poe opened his mouth to deliver what he was sure would have been a witty comeback, but just then he felt a weird little tug somewhere in his chest. Beside him, Finn gasped and hunched over a little. Another tug put him in mind of a cork being pulled out of a bottle, and then there was a moment of dizziness and warmth that flowed from him into Rey, passing through her and onwards into Ben Solo's body.

It was anticlimactic, really. Poe had hoped for a bit more flash and sizzle to it all, but in the end, it played out like this: Rey drained their life force into Ben until he started to feel a little weak in the knees, and then, from one moment to the next, Ben's eyelashes fluttered open. (They were long, which was really unfair because up until a few hours ago he'd been evil, and no one who was evil should have eyelashes this long or eyes that were soft and warm and- okay, maybe Rey had sapped him of a bit more than just his life force. Though if some people were to be believed, (and Poe usually ignored those people) his reservoir of common sense had never been the deepest to begin with.)

"You- you brought me back." Ben's voice was rough, and Poe tried very, _very_ hard not to like the sound of it. Its effect was only slightly mitigated by the confused disbelief he heard in it.

" _We_ brought you back," Rey said with a watery smile. "What were you thinking draining yourself to heal me?"

"I couldn't let you die. If one of us had to go, it should have been me."

"Don't say that."

But Ben shook his head. "You grew up hard and still tried to make the best of it while I wasted every chance I got. You deserve a future far more than I do. I brought you back because I couldn't _not_ do it. I want you to have a long, _a happy_ life, one that's not tied to duty or sacrifice."

Finn and Poe exchanged a look behind Rey's back.

"He's kinda making it hard to hate him right now." Poe stage-whispered.

"Give him a chance to rest up. I'm sure the more charming parts of his personality will reassert themselves."

"You could have just given me enough to bring me back. There was no need for all this self-sacrificing," Rey insisted with evident displeasure.

"Wait. Are you telling us, he had a big-damn-hero moment?" Finn asked.

"I'm sure it was accidental," Poe groused.

It wasn't that he was envious, exactly. He was glad that the guy had done at least one thing right and used the Force to bring Rey back. Under similar circumstances, he and Finn would have done the same. So he couldn't _technically_ begrudge Ben the opportunity to behave like a half-way decent human being for once. He totally couldn't.

But, _on the whole_ , he felt that it was better if those moments actually belonged to the heroes rather than former enemies who _might be_ allies at this moment but could still not be completely trusted even if he felt unaccountably attracted to them. It was about the principle of the thing.

"I thought-" Ben swallowed heavily without meeting their eyes. "I thought it would make things easier for everyone if I'm gone. Make a clean break of it."

 _Oh, hell no,_ Poe thought as Rey grabbed him by the front of his shirt, told him that she wanted to slap the stupid out of him, and then kissed him instead.

 _This guy._ _This_ fucking _guy._

He and Finn exchanged a long-suffering look. "What do say to this then?" He gestured vaguely between the four of them.

Finn shrugged. "I guess this is will be a bigger thing now."

"Just like that?"

"Let's be real, we love Rey too much not to let her keep him, and she's more than capable of kicking his ass if he doesn't behave himself."

Poe wanted to argue but he was too tickled by Finn talking about Ben as if he were a stray puppy they were taking in. A formerly evil puppy. With gorgeous hair.

He looked over to Ben and Rey who were still holding on to each other as if they had no plans of ever letting go. At least they'd stopped kissing, and the activity had brought quite the fetching flush to both their faces.

"Alright," he said, conceding defeat. "I am good with both you and you," he said pointing to Finn and Rey. Addressing Ben, he continued. "You, on the other hand, are on probation until you make me believe that you're really willing to make up for all the shit you've done."

He jumped to his feet and took in the dazed expression on Ben's face. It was a good look on him, he decided.

Rey slipped her hand into his and gave it a light squeeze. "We'll be with you in a minute."

"We'll wait," Finn reassured her before he threw an arm around Poe's shoulder. "Let's go."

"I suppose I'll warm up to him, eventually," Poe grumbled though even he had to admit that there wasn't much protest in his voice.

"I think you're halfway there already," Finn laughed. “Think of all the arguments the two of you will have.”

Poe perked up. “That's a good point.”

* * *

"What just happened?" Ben asked softly as he watched Finn and Poe's retreating backs.

Rey rested her forehead against his temple and reveled in the fact that she could feel his heartbeat under the palm of her hand. Another minute and she would sink against him and fall asleep for about a week, or at least that's how tired she felt, but she was determined to enjoy that minute for all it was worth.

"I think you just got roped into a four-way relationship without being asked if that's what you actually want," she replied lightly.

"O- _kay_... I don't know how I feel about that." He sounded more bewildered than fundamentally opposed to the idea, which made Rey chuckle.

"I'm sure they're open to negotiations about the logistics of it."

"Well, that's encouraging, I guess." He turned his head to nuzzle her neck, and Rey melted into him, her eyelids falling shut.

It would be so easy to go to sleep right here. Between, Poe's jacket and Ben's body she felt warm and comfortable, though considering that she had spent most of her life sleeping in a make-shift cot in her AT-AT, comfort was a matter of definition.

"Any ideas on what you _do_ want?" she asked drowsily.

Ben stilled against her. "I want-"

It took tremendous effort to raise her head so she could meet his eyes. He looked vulnerable, hesitant, and she cupped his face and brushed her thumb along his cheek to dispel his uncertainty.

"A hot shower," he finally said with a crooked smile. "A place to sleep. A hot meal," but then his expression turned serious. "I want to live."

That, at least, woke Rey up. "They're not going to execute you," she said fiercely. "I won't let them."

"Locking me up would largely depend on my goodwill to actually _stay_ locked up," he argued with a defeated smile. "I doubt whoever ends up being in charge is going to risk that. And they would have the same problem if they exiled me."

"Which is why your talents can be put to better use." She brushed a few loose strands of hair out of his eyes. "This path will be harder than the one you chose for yourself."

Ben nodded and tightened his arms around her. "I know."

"Do you regret-"

"No." His tone brooked no argument. "I'm here with you... and apparently Finn and Poe don't hate me, which is more than I deserve. I'll do everything I can, accept any punishment, work every job they give me not to lose that."

She searched his face, hope and the tentative bud of joy blooming within her. "I believe you," she said.

Bending down, she kissed him again until he picked her up and carried her to the Falcon.


End file.
